


The 3A.M. Confession

by SabbyWrites



Series: S-Supports [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Kakusei | Fire Emblem: Awakening
Genre: Alcohol, Childhood Friends, Cunnilingus, Friends to Lovers, Gender-neutral Reader, Love Confessions, Mutual Pining, Other, Reader has female anatomy, Vaginal Fingering, Vaginal Sex, Wartime Romance, implied Chrom/Sumia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-15
Updated: 2017-09-15
Packaged: 2018-12-30 06:48:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12103089
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SabbyWrites/pseuds/SabbyWrites
Summary: “Did you mean it?”Stahl speaks so softly that for a moment, you mistake his words for the wind. He’s looking down at you with that unreadable expression on his face again, and it makes something foreign flutter from your stomach all the way into your throat. You open your mouth to reply with something neutral, something that doesn’t force the two of you into a situation that you can’t come back from, but what comes out instead is:“Yes.”(In which you're stupidly in love with your best friend, and he's not about to pass up the opportunity to reciprocate.)





	The 3A.M. Confession

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to Zen and [krystallisert](http://archiveofourown.org/users/krystallisert/pseuds/krystallisert) for beta reading this for me, especially given how hefty of a piece it is. Much love to you two as well. xx

You hadn’t meant for things to happen the way that they did. 

In fact, the conversation had started innocently enough. Hunkered around the dying embers of that night’s campfire, you and Stahl had simply been conversing in low murmurs like the two of you usually did when you were assigned to stand watch. The events of the day’s battle had been your original topic of discussion, though looking back on it, you suppose that the small canteen of ale that the knight had been passing back and forth with you over the duration of the hour had something to do with the eventual deviation in focus. That, and the fact that it was getting increasingly harder as the weeks went by to ignore the way your heart seemed to leap into your throat every time your childhood friend smiled in your direction, or how there seemed to be less and less space between the two of you every time you were in the same vicinity, or—

“I really thought that was it for me out there.” Stahl sighs, taking a minuscule sip from the canteen before passing it back to you. You immediately snap back to attention, thankful that the light from the fire has dimmed enough to mask the flush spreading on your cheeks. 

Instead of focusing on the way his fingers lightly brush yours as you move to grab the flask, you force yourself to remember the skirmish against the army of Risen that had occurred in the morning. Despite his statement, Stahl doesn’t look much worse for wear; however, you know better than anyone that magic is perhaps the best healer. 

“But it wasn’t.” You reply with a little bit of force, nudging him with your foot. Stahl blinks, eyes momentarily hazy in that oddly distant way that you know occurs every time he reminds himself of his own mortality, before a slow smile spreads itself on his face. You’re not sure if it’s forced or not— Stahl has always been particularly good at putting on a happy front for you— but there’s still a level of genuine thankfulness in it that does nothing to calm how warm you feel in that moment. 

“I have you to thank for that.” He says, gesturing with his head to your tent, where you know your staff is laying next to your bundle of blankets. You hide your pleased smile with a quick sip of ale, taking as little as you possibly can and letting the alcohol spread across your tastebuds like wildfire. 

“You act like I work miracles. Lissa would have done the exact same thing.” 

“Yeah, but Lissa didn’t knock the head of a Risen soldier clean off with her staff while desperately trying to get to me.” 

You huff playfully. “You got _stabbed_ , Stahl!” 

“I’m aware.” He raises a brow in an equally playful manner, though it does very little to dispel the vague sense of morbidness hanging around the two of you. You almost don’t want to blink for a moment, scared that the image of Stahl with a hole punctured in his armor will flash behind your eyelids again, but you have to; when you look back over at your best friend, he’s still there. Still breathing. Still smiling at you with that reassuring curl of his lips that he always used to give you when the two of you were children. 

You swallow harshly. Your throat feels like sandpaper. And then, you take the conversation down a path that you won’t be able to return from. 

“Weren’t you scared?” 

His smile drops just a little. Anyone but you might not have noticed it, but you’ve spent so much time looking at the knight over the years that you can practically register every flinch of muscle in his face. A moment of silence passes between the two of you before he speaks again, his eyes going from your face to the orange-y coals of the fire. 

“Yeah. I was.” 

You nod, because there’s not much else you can do. You almost regret asking him; it’s not often that such a pensive expression crosses his face, but he seems so lost in thought in the moment that you don’t bother to apologize. He takes your silence as a cue to continue on. 

“There’s lots I haven’t done. I think about that a lot when I’m out there, and sometimes it really gets to me, you know?” Stahl tips the canteen back into his mouth and makes an incredulous sound whenever he finds that only a few sips of ale remain. You can’t help the way the corner of your mouth turns up at the noise. 

“I know. I feel that way too, sometimes.” You reply, leaning back on your hands and casting your gaze back to the dying fire. 

“Yeah?” 

“Yeah. Like, I’ve never ridden on a Wyvern before. I wanted to know what it’s like.” 

Stahl doesn’t looked surprised in the slightest— you’d always told him when you were little that you wanted to be a Wyvern rider— but his olive-colored brows still lift slightly as he mulls over your answer. 

“You could always ask Cherche to take you up on Minerva.” 

“Yeah, I could.” You tilt your head back a little, eyes scanning the stars. You’re far enough from most of the major cities now that they completely overtake the sky, like clustered little pinpricks in a black sheet of fabric. There’s a small rustle as Stahl shifts his position, his beige shirt barely brushing the grass. You think, not for the first time, about how your best friend has filled out over the years. You can faintly recall a time where you used to be the tall one— and now here he is, practically towering over you. 

“I’ve never had a Feroxi pastry.” Stahl says after a long moment, reeling your attention back to the conversation at hand. 

“I wasn’t aware Ferox was known for its pastries.” You snort. He laughs. 

“It’s not. But Lon’qu and Olivia have both told me about this place not too far from the border that apparently serves the best profiteroles. I didn’t get to try them last time we were there.” 

“Maybe you did and you’ve just forgotten,” you tease, “after all, I think it’d be hard for you to keep track of everything you’ve ever had, with your eating habits!” 

“Yeah, well… okay, you got me there.” Stahl relents, his laugh low and rich and warm enough that you want to wrap yourself in it. “What else?” 

You hum at his question, wondering if he’s just asking to have something to talk about or if he’s genuinely curious. “I’ve always wanted to learn to sword fight, but _someone_ won’t teach me.” 

You can’t see it, but you know Stahl is grinning widely at you. “Aw, come on. I’m so average, _____, you’d be better off learning from Frederick or Chrom.”

“But I want to learn from you! I doubt Frederick would go easy on me, and Chrom is always so busy.” 

“Frederick isn’t as intense as all the other knights make him out to be.” Stahl points out, and although you’re well aware that he’s right, you’d still use any excuse to wrangle some more alone time with the viridian knight instead. 

“I guess you have a point. Nobody cowers at the thought of eating bear meat quite like him.” You draw one of your legs in a little closer to your torso, still looking at the sky. You like nights like this, where you can talk to Stahl about anything at all. It feels so aimless, as if you have all the time in the world, even though the actual topic of your discussion still lingers on the morbid side. 

What else do you want to do before you die? 

You ask him that same question again and he makes a contemplative sound. 

“I want to learn how to garden. Not just herbs like my father and brother grow, but food. I want an apple tree in my backyard.” 

You smile to yourself, thinking about Stahl climbing a tree and picking his own apples. With his appetite, you’re certain that he’d climb up and eat most of them before they even fell from the branches. 

“That’d be nice. I think I’d like a pumpkin patch, myself. So I can eat the seeds and make pies and carve faces into them with my kids.” 

Stahl’s nose wrinkles just a bit as he smiles. “Kids, huh?”

You shrug with a forced nonchalance that you hope he can’t read, even though you know better than anyone that Stahl’s perception knows no bounds; still, if he notices, he doesn’t say anything. “Yeah. Maybe. I’m not sure.”

“Why not?” 

“With the way this war is going, I’m not sure I’ll get the chance to even consider it.” 

You gaze at the fire with a look that you’re almost certain betrays your thoughts. This time, Stahl doesn’t hesitate to address what you’re not telling him. 

“You’re going to live through this.” He insists, leaning towards you just a little. You fight the nervous urge to lean backwards the same amount, instead trying to count the amount of freckles on his cheeks. The flickering of the flames makes it hard. 

“Even if I do,” you begin, “there’s still the fact that most of the men in Ylisse are… gross, to put it nicely.” 

Stahl snorts despite himself, not quite expecting you to veer the conversation into a lighter tone. “You think so?”

You scrunch up your nose. “Definitely. They’re all either Ike wannabes or sleazy shop owners. Not quite husband or father material.” 

You let your head fall back a fraction, suddenly aware of how heavy it feels. Had you been buzzed this whole time? Your tongue darts out to wet your lips as you realize that they feel dry. You miss the way Stahl’s eyes follow the movement. 

He lets out a laugh that has only a small amount of humor in it. You can tell that he’s thinking of a witty retort to your comment, but you continue before you can even stop yourself. 

“Not quite first time material, really.”

The admission hangs in the air like the crackle of magic, and it’s almost just as devastating; in fact, you’re pretty sure you’d rather be hit square in the chest with one of Henry’s hexes than think about what you’ve just said. 

Stahl seems to take his sweet time mulling your words over. A little too long, in fact, and it’s the clearest indicator that he has more to say than he’s willing to admit. 

“So, you’ve never—”

“No, I haven’t.” You interject quickly. Almost a little _too_ quickly, if the way he looks at you is any indication. “I was waiting for the right person.”

“The right person.” It sounds less like a question than it does just numb repetition of your statement. 

“Yeah. Someone I’m comfortable with. Someone I wouldn’t feel vulnerable around, someone that knows me for who I am. The type of person that would make sure I feel cared for.” 

Stahl audibly swallows. You know he knows what you’re about to say next, and yet that doesn’t hinder you in the slightest. It all comes pouring from you like a burst dam, and although alcohol is hardly to blame for the feelings swirling inside of you, it surely doesn’t help the situation. 

“Someone like you, I guess. I’ve been thinking about it and I— well, I just think that with you, it would be a good experience.” 

You feel like all sound mutes itself in the following moments. Even the chirping of the crickets and crackle of the fire seem to pause, as if the entire Earth is holding its breath in anticipation of Stahl’s reply. The cold fingers of anxiety dig into your stomach, and you realize that you’ve made a massive mistake, one that you’re not sure your friendship can recover from. You’ve just admitted to Stahl that you see him differently; even though you haven’t revealed the full extent of your feelings towards him, making a sexual proposition to your best friend is no slip of the tongue. Your cards are all there on the table, and he’s just staring at you, mouth moving but no words coming out. 

You tell yourself that it’s a trick of the fire when his eyes soften. That he’s not about to reciprocate. But your heart soars on instinct, just to crash back down when his expression hardens. You’re not quite sure what to make of the sudden change, and the same boldness that prompted you to confess makes you want to press the issue, but before you can, the sound of another tent flap opening shatters the moment. 

“Stahl? _____?”

The two of you whip to the left so fast that you’re almost certain you’ll break your own neck. Your guilty gaze meets Chrom’s own tired one, the faint glow from both the moon and what’s left of the fire only exacerbating the darkness of his under-eye circles. He smiles softly at you. 

“Chrom!” Your voice comes out a little louder than you intended it to, thanks to the fact that the lord had startled the two of you out of… whatever it was that was happening. You clear your throat immediately, dropping your voice a few decibels with your next statement. “You’re up late. Sumia hogging the blankets again?”

Chrom shrugs. “I felt bad, having you and Stahl on lookout tonight after everything that happened today.”

“Oh, it’s really not that bad—” Stahl begins, but Chrom just shakes his head. 

“It was a long day for you, healed or not. Just take a break, alright? I expect the two of you to be up bright and early tomorrow.” 

“Chrom—” Stahl tries again. The Exalt sighs. 

“_____? Please make sure he gets some rest.”

You smile at Chrom as widely as you can given the butterflies raging in your stomach, throwing in a mock salute for good measure that he chuckles at. Standing, you dust off any loose blades of grass and dirt from your leggings before looking over at Stahl, who is very obviously refusing to meet your gaze. You almost frown at that, but you don’t want Chrom asking any questions about your discussion before he emerged from his tent; instead, you gently grasp Stahl’s upper arm and tug him towards his own tent, on the far outskirts of the camp. 

The air gets colder the farther away from the fire the two of you walk, but Stahl’s body is warm under your hand so you don’t let go. You suppose that he wants you to, if his slightly uncomfortable expression is anything to go by, but you can’t find it in yourself to do so. The two of you walk in silence until finally his tent is right there, hastily erected by him a few hours earlier so that he could rush off to get dinner. 

It’s here that you let go. 

“Well,” you sigh, a little uneasy, “goodni—” 

“Did you mean it?” 

Stahl speaks so softly that for a moment, you mistake his words for the wind. He’s looking down at you with that unreadable expression on his face again, and it makes something foreign flutter from your stomach all the way into your throat. You open your mouth to reply with something neutral, something that doesn’t force the two of you into a situation that you can’t come back from, but what comes out instead is: 

“Yes.” 

He inhales sharply through his nose, as if he’s been told life-altering news; and perhaps he has, you suppose, because it isn’t every day that your best friend of over twenty years confirms that they’d like to have sex with you. His hands clench into fists softly at his side, and then uncurl again, as if he’s doing it just to fidget. 

“I’m sorry,” you sigh, a little past embarrassment at this point, “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, Stahl. I shouldn’t have said what I did, and it’s okay if you want to forget about it.”

There’s a moment of pause between the two of you that you can only describe as a clap of silent thunder; there’s no sound, but somehow something moves between the two of you, full of static and the promise of a storm coming over the horizon. 

“Forget about it?” Stahl lets out a small laugh that has everything but humor in it. “You told me you wanted me to take your virginity, and now you want me to forget about it?” 

You cross your arms, brows slightly furrowing. “Stahl, I’m sorry if I offended you—”

“What if I don’t want to forget about it?” 

The rest of your sentence dies in your throat. 

“Since we were fifteen, all I’ve wanted is for you to see me as a man. Not as the kid you grew up with, not as a fellow soldier— but someone you could count on. Someone worth sharing things in life with.” 

“But Stahl, we already—”

“I don’t mean as friends, _____,” for a second, he sounds almost bitter. “I mean… Gods, who cares what I mean?”

“I care, Stahl.” You try and keep your voice even for the sake of the people sleeping in the tents next to you.

He sighs. It sounds defeated, rather than upset. “I know, I know. That’s the problem.”

Your eyebrows crease together. “What? That makes no sense!”

A few lightning bugs glimmer off into the distance. You might have been distracted, had the sight of Stahl looking at you with such an uncharacteristically serious face not kept your gaze rooted in place. 

“_____,” he murmurs, “I’m in love with you. And I know this isn’t ideal, and I know you don’t feel the same way, but today… today made me realize that there really is a chance I won’t live through this war. And when you said that tonight, it just—”

“You’re in _love_ with me?” 

Stahl looks caught between amusement and pain. “Yes, _____. I have been since we were fifteen.”

“Then how is me caring about you the problem?” You snap. Stahl looks almost irritated with you, an uncharacteristically irked expression flitting across his face at your change in tone. 

“Because it’s not the way I _want_ you to care! Don’t you get that? I don’t want to be a ‘good first experience’ for you. I don’t want to be the person you fall back on just because there’s nobody else more appealing! I want to be your _husband_ , _____!” 

“Who said I was opposed to that, Stahl? For as good as you are at reading people, you seemed to have missed the giant, _massive_ clues that should have told you I felt the exact same way!”

The only thing that breaks the sudden silence between the two of you is the sound of a frog croaking in the distance, accompanied by a handful of crickets. You spare only a second of thought to the fact that it’s very possible someone back at the camp (namely Chrom, you hate to admit) could have heard the two of you bickering. 

Then, your thoughts are occupied by something else. 

Stahl takes a step closer to you, and it’s all he needs to wrap an arm around the small of your back, yanking you body to his. The fabric of his tunic is soft under your fingers, well-worn and comforting. 

You know what he’s going to do the second his head begins to tilt downwards, and you almost shudder in anticipation. Yet the first time he kisses you, there’s no life-changing flash of emotions. The world doesn’t wobble on its axis. Angels don’t descend from the heavens and sing all around you. But it’s raw and it’s real and you’re so consumed with it that it certainly feels like something monumental. A giant leap forward, maybe, or the sensation of wind on the wings of a bird flying for the first time. This is _Stahl_ , the knight who gives his all for the kingdom and for _you_ , and he’s making a wordless promise to you with that first kiss. 

You reciprocate immediately, hands coming up to rest on both of his cheeks. The ends of his hair brush over the shell of his ear and onto the tips of your fingers and it makes you smile into the kiss, your entire body warm and glowing as if every star in the sky is suddenly inside of you. This feels right, and that alone is enough to make you shift closer to him, the toes of your shoes touching in the dewy grass. 

When he pulls away, he rests his forehead onto yours.

“I’m an idiot, aren’t I?” He murmurs, traces of agitation gone from his face. You smile up at him, peering at his content face through your lashes. 

“You are,” you say, “but so am I. Nobody’s fault, really.” 

“You sure? Because—”

“Stahl.” 

“Yeah?”

“I want to spend the night with you.” 

You don’t have any ale to blame for your sudden bout of courage; the walk back to his tent had done more than enough to sober you up. It’s courage born from reciprocation, the knowledge that Stahl isn’t going to say no. Even if his words and his kiss hadn’t been enough, the soft look he gives you says it all. 

“Of course.” 

His tent is smaller than yours, which is a bit of a shame. His armor takes up a fair amount of space, leaving just enough room for his javelin and his bedding. It takes a little bit of maneuvering to get onto it, slowed down just a bit by the fact that Stahl keeps pulling you close to plant small kisses all over you— the bridge of your nose, the corner of your mouth, your hairline, your jaw— and by him closing the tent flap behind him, leaving the two of you to fumble around in the darkness of the early morning. 

It’s a miracle you don’t fall onto his armor but onto his bed instead, your back sinking in as Stahl crawls over top of you. He tries to kiss you square on the mouth but he misses and catches your cheek, causing you to giggle softly right into his ear. You can feel him smile against your skin. 

“Funny?” 

“A little.” You hum, hands circling around to the back of his head. His legs are next to yours, his hesitance to crawl between yours slightly obvious when paired with his somewhat unsure movements. You expected nothing else, and you’re sure that your own grip on his hair is a little tight, betraying your nerves. 

“Tell me to stop.” He murmurs after a small stretch of silence, and you feel the warmth of his palm on your hip suddenly, as if it might scorch you through your layers of clothing. You blink up at him, even though the quizzical movement is mostly lost in the grey-black atmosphere around you. 

“Why would I do that?” 

“Well,” he starts, pausing to pepper a few kisses onto your skin again, “isn’t this the reverse of what we should be doing? I should be courting you properly, and then proposing, and then on the night of our wedding we—”

“Stahl.” You say his name as a sigh but it comes out more reverent than irritated. 

“Yes?”

“We’ve practically been courting our whole lives.” 

He contemplates your rebuttal for only a few seconds. “You’re right.” 

“I know I am,” your hand goes from being tangled in his hair to circling around his shoulders, broad and strong. You pull him down closer until you can tell just by the tension in the air that his body is nearly pressed to your own. His breathing stutters almost imperceptibly when you kiss him again, tongue finding the seam of his lips and gently sliding forward, past his teeth. He welcomes the intrusion, dipping his own into your mouth and it takes a moment— neither of you are particularly well-versed in the movements of intimacy, your duties as Shepherds always coming first and foremost— but it’s the same sort of simple that your first kiss was. Easy. Natural. You think you could kiss him for the rest of your lives, just because of how wrapped up in him you feel, but he pulls back too soon for you to get completely lost in your thoughts. 

The hand on your hip slides under the weave of your top, the calloused pads of his fingers causing goosebumps to erupt on the skin they skim over. You look up at him, eyes having adjusted slightly to the lighting— just enough to see him bite down on his lip when his hand reaches the cloth of your chest wrappings. You use them for extra support on the battlefield, but now they feel more like a hindrance than anything. 

“Can I?” He asks, almost too politely. His hesitance isn’t without foundation, as you feel the same sort of nerves buzzing in your veins as well, but you know that any experience that Stahl will give you will be one that you can look back on fondly. 

“Of course.” 

He pulls it over your head slowly, and you have to wiggle a bit to make sure it doesn’t get caught on the underside of your nose. You nearly laugh as you pull your arms from the sleeves, but then Stahl’s fingers begin working on the wrappings; his reverent expression makes your mouth snap shut. 

The tent is silent as you allow your top to crumple on the ground next to the bed, arching your back so that Stahl can more easily unwind the cloth binding your breasts. Goosebumps rise on your skin as the cool morning air skims across your newly exposed skin, and then he’s dropping the fabric next to your top and staring at you in an almost dumbfounded way. 

As if your body can articulate your thoughts better than words, you begin to fumble with the buttons that close the front of his shirt together, cursing the fact that he has it done up all the way to the collar. He almost seems enraptured by your determination for a moment before his senses return to him, and he helps you with the buttons so that he can slide the garment from his shoulders as quickly as possible. 

His skin is hot to the touch and you can’t get enough of it, the way it seems to radiate the same warmth that peeks out in his personality. You can’t see detail in the darkness as well as you might have if the tent were closer to the fire, but you know just from memory that every muscle you trace has a smattering of freckles across it. It strikes you again just how much your best friend has matured from a gangly boy into a well-formed man. You wonder if he thinks something similar about you when he drags his hands down your now-bare sides, relishing in the sensation of your soft skin under his war-calloused palms. 

He doesn’t ask verbally if he can remove your bottoms when he gets to them; his hands instead pause for a fraction of a second before a few of his long fingers are skimming underneath your waistband, leaving trails of warmth that feel like fire. 

“Stahl,” you say, although you’re not quite sure why. He hums a low note in response, bending down to kiss you again as he begins to undress you further. 

He makes quicker work of your bottom half than he did your top, perhaps because of excitement or impatience. Either way, you find yourself pressing your body even closer to his in an attempt to reclaim some of the warmth he took from you, and he seems more than happy to oblige. Stahl has began to tower over you in recent years, yes, but you never really realized how massive he seemed until his whole frame pushed up against you. 

He breaks the kiss so that he can plant another one on your collarbone, then on the top of your breast, and then—

He takes your nipple into his mouth softly, almost hesitantly, but the way your breath stutters out of your lungs seems to embolden him just a bit. His tongue drags over it, the textured surface making you shiver just a little. He sucks on it for a moment, almost as if he’s experimenting, before he switches to the other one. Your hand once more returns to his hair and it takes a good portion of your self control to make sure that you don’t rip a handful of it from his scalp; his teasing is featherlight, but already you can feel a spark of something foreign in your veins. 

Although he certainly admires them, Stahl doesn’t seem to find much satisfaction in just toying with your chest. After a few more moments of mouthing at your nipple, he slides his body back and his lips go with it, your hand releasing his hair. He presses small kisses in increments down your stomach, peppered with light stings that you think may come from him scraping his teeth gently against the soft flesh. In your arousal, it takes a second for you to realize what he’s attempting to do, and by the time your eyes widen in shock, he’s already hoisting your legs over his broad shoulders. 

“Hey, you don’t have to—” You start, but he nuzzles the side of his face against your calf as he lifts your bottom half from the bed. It hadn’t even occurred to you once to cover your crotch from his sight, and although you’re a little flustered now, you still don’t see the need to. 

“Have you ever known me to pass up a meal?” He murmurs, and the bend of your knees comes to finally rest on his shoulders so that his face is directly in front of your cunt. The feeling of having part of your body raised doesn’t distract you much, not with the way every breath he takes sends cold air over your skin. 

“I guess not.” You reply, and although you know his joke was an attempt to lighten things up just a bit, there’s no ignoring the gravity of the situation that you’re in. Stahl’s lips ghost over the skin of your inner thighs, and you can feel them curl upwards into a smile that makes your heart feel like it’s doing a somersault. You know he’ll take care of you, will make this the best experience for you that he possibly can, and that in itself feels like it has more weight than the impending thought of being joined for the first time.

His first lick is experimental. Broad, flat, starting at your opening and ending at your clit. You swallow hard, hands fisting into the sheets on either side of you as his lower lip drags against that bundle of nerves. He does it again, this time taking care to let the tip of his tongue dip inside of you, and your reaction is all he needs to dive in headfirst. 

Stahl gives you little warning when he slides his entire tongue inside of you, his hands immediately coming to rest on top of your thighs so that he can keep them in place as he gets to work. He seems unsure what to do from there, though, and it takes a few seconds for him to decide to curl his tongue upwards. You shiver, making a sound that is equal parts pathetic and erotic, and it only makes him straighten his tongue out so that he can do it again. 

He finds a rhythm soon enough, alternating between curling his tongue inside you and circling around your clit, allowing himself the boldness to suck on it a few times in between. His lack of variation in any other way comes more from inexperience than it does laziness, and you decide to voice your preference. 

“M-more…” You stammer when his lips close around your clit again, and you swear you can see a glimmer in his eyes as they lock with your own. He nods slowly, one of his hands slipping from your thigh and coming up under your leg, his long fingers teasing your saliva-covered opening. Then slowly, _slowly_ , he pushes two digits inside of you, his gaze never leaving your own as he does so. A long and low sound fills the tent, and it takes you a second to realize that it came from your own mouth, a desperate keen that has Stahl curling his fingers inside of you as he sucks on your clit. 

Your legs nearly crush his head between your thighs as he flicks his tongue inside of you alongside his fingers, then pulls it out to focus on your clit again; with your vocal encouragement, he seems to shed some of his trepidation. You feel the vibration of his chuckle as he pulls your thighs apart so that you aren’t squeezing his skull.

“Stahl, please!” You whine. His brows furrow gently as you prop yourself up on your elbows, chest heaving. “Please, fuck me!” 

You hear him swallow audibly. “Now? But I only just started!” 

“Now.” You want it to sound like a command, like you aren’t already so thoroughly anticipating him inside of you, but your voice reads more between a whine and a plea. You’re surprised that he doesn’t call you on it.

You suppose his mind is occupied by other things. 

He allows you to pull your legs forward and off of his shoulders, falling somewhat ungracefully onto the bed. His attention doesn’t seem to be on them, though; his hands moving to the front of his cotton pants, just a few shades darker than his shirt. He dons them more for practicality under his armor than for fashion, but to you they may as well be the most elaborate gift wrapping on the entire continent. It feels like ages as you watch him undo the knot of the drawstring. When he finally stands to let them fall to the ground, you can’t even attempt to look like you’re not openly staring. 

His erection strains against his undergarments enough so that it’s clear to you, even in the dark, what you’re looking at. You have no prior experience with intimacy, so you can’t tell if his habit of remaining average extends to it as well, but when he pulls his underwear down, you have no complaints. It’s not bad to look at, slightly curved upwards, and frankly you’re glad that it’s not overly huge. It makes your impending loss of virginity seem more doable, in a way. 

He crawls over you again when he’s fully naked, until he can press his lips against yours and kiss you again. Your lubrication still remains on his lips and there’s a slightly tangy taste that you know comes from you in his mouth, but it’s not entirely unpleasant and so you press back into the kiss with full force, only dimly aware of the additional wetness smeared on his upper lip and chin. 

You want to feel more of him, want to pull him as close as possible, so your hands roam over as much as they can. The rolling bumps of his spine, the dips between each muscle, sinew and meat moving underneath his skin as he adjusts his weight over yours; everything feels so wonderful and so _perfect_ that you’re not even sure it’s real. But then your fingers skim over his neck, over his racing pulse, and it keeps you grounded. 

He grinds his hips down on yours out of instinct more than anything, his cock sliding against your clit. The friction is only amplified by the cooled saliva and lubricant still coating it. 

Your breath hitches, and he hears it. 

“Are you sure?” He murmurs, and you know that his question is the only thing keeping the two of you from finally being joined. Despite your certainty that this is what you want, the fact that he’s even bothering to ask reminds you of why you love him so much. 

You nod, and although it’s dark you know he can see you at least well enough to make it out. He presses a soft, almost chaste kiss to your lips as he takes his cock in his hand, dragging it down the apex of your legs and collecting wetness on the head until he finds your entrance. Then, he slowly pushes himself in. 

It feels weird. Not bad, not by a long shot, but you’ve never felt such a sensation sweep over your skin all at once. Stahl isn’t hurting you, certainly, but as your breathing hitches in his ear, he immediately stills his hips. 

“Are you alright?” 

“Yeah,” you whisper, your toes curling into his linen sheets, “I’m… wow.” 

“I’m not hurting you?”

“Not at all,” you kiss the corner of his mouth, “keep going.” 

There’d been gossip, among people slightly higher-born than yourself, that there would be pain during sex. That you’d bleed, you’d cry, and it would last only thirty seconds before your partner would be laying down next to you and snoring. But as inexperienced as you were, you’d never really believed that having sex with Stahl would be anything like that; you were pleased to discover that you’d been entirely correct. He’s gentle when he finishes pressing himself into you, and you feel nothing but white-hot pleasure at the movement. Your fingers find an anchor in the flesh of his back, your fingernails digging in slightly as he finds his own rhythm, pulling out only slightly just to push your hips flush once again. 

One of his hands remains splayed next to your head, keeping him suspended over you as his other one dips down to your clit, pressing down so that he can rub tight circles onto it. It rips a sound from your throat that is surely loud enough to wake a sleeping Shepherd, and yet you find yourself not caring in the slightest. Stahl feels so good, inside of you and around you and just _everywhere_ that your head feels like it might be spinning. His pace picks up and his breathing gets more ragged, the sound of your hips smacking together muffled only a tiny bit by the fabric of his tent. Your head tilts back into his pillow and he eagerly takes the chance to attach his lips to the column of your throat in a bid to mask the low noises rising up from his chest. You almost wish he wouldn’t hide them, but the last shred of reasonable thought that remains in your mind assures you that explaining even more noises during breakfast would be beyond awkward. 

You bite down on your bottom lip when his thrusts get more brutal— once, twice, and then they’re still against yours, fingers still on your clit as a groan vibrates against your neck. He inhales and it almost sounds like he’s choking on his own pleasure, buried inside of you until his hips are almost painful against yours. Something warm leaks out of you, streaking down your inner thigh and onto the bedding, but you don’t pay it much mind. You cradle Stahl’s face in your hands, smiling softly up at him despite the fact that he may not be able to make out the expression in his post-orgasm haze. 

“That was wonderful.” You murmur, pulling him down for a kiss. He allows it, but pulls back after a single peck. 

“You say that like I’m finished.” He says, and then his hips are moving again, the glide of him inside of you made all the more obscene and slippery by his emission; you make a noise of surprise, grabbing at his shoulders. This was the last thing you expected, but you were far from complaining. He’s still hard inside of you, the clapping of your hips together nearly drowning out the wet noise of him penetrating you. 

He’s no longer chasing his own orgasm, and so his attention is fully on you. His fingers resume their rhythm on your clit, and it’s not too long before a foreign feeling is bubbling inside of you. You want to chase it, want it to overcome you; want everything about this moment to be like the ocean and sweep you away so that you can drown in it. You feel so good that you could die, could transcend to heaven, could—

Your orgasm blindsides you, totally and completely. Everything else ceases to exist to you in that moment. Time is too short and too long, everything is too much or not enough, and then you’re tumbling back into your own body, chanting Stahl’s name like it’s the only thing you know. 

Only when he sees that you’re fully satisfied does Stahl pull himself from you. You want to say something to him, but you’re both out of breath and out of words to use. The tent falls into silence punctuated only by your shared ragged breathing. Stahl’s body lands next to yours on the bed, warm and slick from sweat. You inch closer to it on instinct, and he slings an arm around you to pull you the rest of the way. 

You feel safe. Wanted. 

Loved. 

“I didn’t know men could do that,” you blurt without thinking, and you don’t even have to focus on Stahl’s face to know he’s giving you a quizzical look, “keep going after they came, I mean. I never heard anyone mention that.” 

Stahl snorts out a short bout of laughter, but you suppose it’s more from him being taken aback than finding any humor in your observation. “Some of us can, I guess.”

You giggle, wrapping your arms around his torso. His heartbeat flutters a slightly erratic rhythm in his chest. 

“Besides,” he continues, “even if I was spent, I’d still make sure you were pleased. It’s my job as your future husband, after all.” 

You laugh again, trying to hide the way your heart soars at his words. “You keep that attitude up and I can guarantee that we’ll have a happy marriage.”

“Oh, I could’ve told you that.” He says, grabbing your hand in his own much larger one. He lifts it to his lips and presses a short kiss to the ring finger— the finger that will, in a few short weeks, don a ring from the finest jeweler in all of Ylisse.


End file.
